Why we eat...

We've been married for almost a decade now (even though it feels like longer), and in that time we've eaten a lot of stuff (imagine all the stuff we might have eaten and times it by 3, and that's not even the half of it). Upon reflecting on all the edibles we've consumed in that time, we might say of any particular dish "that's in my top 5 Scandinavian puff pastries" or "that would have to be one of the top 7 edible insects I've ever had." So here we will attempt to make our ultimate top ten list in no particular order (except the very bottom one is the best and they get progressively worse from there). These are the top ten things we have ever eaten, ever, ever.

• Fish tacos. This particular recipe, sent to us by Dannielle Larkin, is one of the best we have ever tried. We've made them with salmon and tilapia (even fish sticks once when we were desperate) and they are always good.

• Peanut butter pretzels and Nutella. Frankly, anything with Nutella is good (including my personal favorite - Nutella and Nutella), but this combination is a real winner. If you can't find peanut butter pretzels, apple slices are a good substitute.

• Pupusas. The people of El Salvador aren't only famous for their uniquely bad dentistry and frequent governmental coups, they also went to heaven and brought back a little dough wrapped ball of salted pork, beans and cheese, patted it flat, fried it up, and gave it to the Earth as the pupusa. If you want one, you can either try this recipe, or go to a pupuseria and have them made for you. We have several in Durham, our favorite being !Coma Rico! who recently improved their Durham County sanitation score from 92 to an impressive 97.5!

• Chicken Tikka Masala. If you don't like Indian food you're a racist or a communist . . . fascist . . . terrorist . . . something disagreeable. Fact is, if I were on a dessert island and all I had was chicken, cumin, yogurt, cinnamon, paprika, salt, heavy cream, cilantro, cayenne pepper, garlic, lemon juice, ginger, tomato sauce and a jalapeno, I could easily survive on this dish. Also on the island I'd have a brick oven for cooking na'an, and some shelter and other crap.

• Sweet Potato Biscuits. We currently live in the South, which means we know what corn-pone is and you don't. We also know that you can make biscuits out of anything, but after you've made them out of sweet potatoes, you won't bother with anything else.

• Tokyo Diner House Special Sushi: We've eaten plenty of sushi that we've liked, but we both have to agree that this was the best single roll we've ever eaten. It's got cooked fish on top with a special sauce made of Okinawan crystal meth and nicotine extract. It's not addictive, we can stop eating it anytime we want to, we just don't want to right now.

• Irmita's Torta (back when it was only $6.00 and their restaurant was still dirty). This may be the only dish on the list not currently available in the form we remember it. Irmita, in her lust for money, moved from her Bluff Street shack in St. George, Utah, to the more uppity, air conditioned half of the Washington, Utah Conoco station. Somewhere during the move, she jacked the price on this south of the border ambrosia, pricing it just out of our budget. We only carry the memories of dressing up in our ponchos and ordering in Spanish hoping they would tell us what was in that special sauce.

• Trader Joe's Mango Passion granola. This is a new one for us, but after 10 boxes in 3 weeks, we can solidly say this is #1 on the cereal list, edging out Cracklin' Oat Bran, and thus in the overall top 10. The Chapel Hill News even says it gives some a reason to get out of bed in the morning.

• Hershey Pantry anything, but stuffed French toast comes to mind first. Every time you go they have a different cream cheese flavor of the day, so even though you order the same thing every time you go, it is actually not the same thing.

• Home-made Australian scones with strawberry jam and unsweetened whipping cream. Unfortunately, Micki hasn't actually tasted this one. I have just talked about it so much she thinks she has. I was in Kuranda, Australia, a village in the rainforest above Cairns with my parents, my brother Tom and sister Lindsay. We got off a train and there near the station a cafe was serving these scones. Tragically, the best food I will ever eat was encountered that day, and it is 10 time zones away. I estimate the cost of actually getting another scone today at more than $10,000 US. That makes those scones not only the most delicious, but also the most expensive thing I have ever eaten.